Grim Reaper had harvested ten thousand souls, but never a devil's. Tonight they meant to take the throne of Hell, and that meant finding the Devil first. The scythe rested across their back. The cloak dragged smoke along the black stone floor. Somewhere beyond these caverns, the Devil held court and ruled every damned thing here. Grim Reaper did not know where. Hell had no maps, and asking questions woke the throne's attention. Wandering blind was the fastest way to die a second time. Grim Reaper had watched three reapers vanish for less. So they carried a plan instead of hope. From under the cloak they drew a small meter. Its face was a blunt cartoon dial, the needle twitching between green and red. The word DUMBMETER glowed across its front. A dead soul had sworn it could sense the Devil's presence from far off. Grim Reaper turned the left knob. The needle jumped toward red, then fell back. They turned it again. This time the needle held steady, pointing one way through the dark. The meter worked. But every sweep of the needle sent a faint hum into the stone, and the hum carried. Grim Reaper felt the caverns notice. The air grew warm. Somewhere far off, something turned to listen. Speed mattered now. Grim Reaper followed the needle down a sloping tunnel. The dial climbed, red bleeding across its face. At the tunnel's mouth stood a plant taller than a man. Its green traps snapped at the air, guarding the way, spiky mouths gnashing. One trap lunged and closed on the cloak. Grim Reaper did not draw the scythe. The scythe was loud. The scythe was a signal. Instead they reached under the cloak and pulled a compact handgun. They pressed it against the plant's thick stem and fired once. The shot cracked flat and quiet in the heat. The plant sagged. Its traps went slack. Grim Reaper stepped over the wilted mouths and pushed forward. The tunnel opened onto a wide floor. Ahead rose a building of pale stone and tall columns, out of place in all that fire. Through its open front Grim Reaper saw rows of red seats, a raised bench, and a set of scales carved above the judge's chair. This was the courtroom. This was where the Devil ruled and passed his sentences. The Dumbmeter's needle buried itself in the red and would go no higher. Grim Reaper had found the court. But the gunshot still echoed off the columns, and the warm air had gone hot. Behind them, footsteps started down the tunnel. Ahead, the courtroom doors swung inward on their own. The Devil knew someone had come. Grim Reaper gripped the scythe and stepped through the doors. The hunt for the throne no longer belonged to them alone.

The doors slammed shut behind Grim Reaper. Stone ground against stone, and the seam sealed flat. No handle. No gap. The footsteps in the tunnel went silent, locked out. Grim Reaper stood alone in the courtroom with the Devil's empty bench above them. The trap had closed. Win here, or die here. There was no third door. Then the floor changed. The red seats folded down and slid away. The tall columns pulled back. A square platform rose from the center of the courtroom, ringed with taut ropes and padded corners. It looked like a fighting ring, out of place among the scales and the judge's chair. The floor had become an arena, and the Devil meant to be watched. Grim Reaper drew the meter from under their cloak. The needle buried itself in red and shivered. The Devil was close. Very close. Grim Reaper turned, following the twitch of the dial, and stopped. The Devil sat on the top rope of the ring, one leg crossed over the other, grinning. He tapped the rope like a man testing a chair. "You woke my whole house with that toy," he said. "Come up. Nobody claims my throne from the floor." Grim Reaper climbed through the ropes. The scythe was loud, and there was no one left to hide from now. They drew it. The blade caught the fire-light. Ten thousand souls had ended on that edge, but never a devil's. The Devil moved first. He came off the rope fast and swung. Grim Reaper ducked and slashed. The scythe raked his side and drew black smoke, not blood. He laughed and grabbed the shaft. They wrestled across the mat, boots skidding, ropes snapping against their backs. The Devil was strong. He bent Grim Reaper backward over the top rope and reached for the scythe. Grim Reaper let go of the scythe with one hand. They pulled the compact handgun from under the cloak. They pressed it against the Devil's ribs and fired. The shot cracked. The Devil jerked. His grip loosened. Grim Reaper twisted free, swung the scythe two-handed, and buried the blade in his chest. The Devil sagged against the ropes. Smoke poured from the wound. His grin held, then thinned. "Clever," he said. "But you cut too soon." A thread of light pulled loose from his body toward the scythe. His soul. Grim Reaper leaned in to take it. The soul did not come clean. It caught on the blade and split. Half of it sank into the scythe. The other half poured down through the mat, into the stone, into Hell itself. The courtroom shuddered. The bench cracked. The scales above the judge's chair fell and shattered. Grim Reaper held half a devil's soul. The throne had no ruler now. But the other half had gone somewhere down into Hell, and something below had begun to stir.

The dust settled in the ruined courtroom. Grim Reaper stood in the wrestling ring, half a devil's soul humming inside the scythe. The throne above the wreckage sat empty. But the tunnels around the hall were filling with sound. Boots. Dragging feet. The court had heard the fight, and now the court was coming to see who dared sit above them. They came through every archway at once. Dead courtiers in rotted finery, jaws slack, eyes empty. A shambling horde in the tatters of old robes. They packed the broken floor and stared up at the ring. One of them, a bent thing in a purple coat, spoke for them all. "The bench is broken. The scales are gone. You are not our master." The horde pressed closer to the ropes. Grim Reaper understood the danger. The Devil was dead, but no one obeyed a stranger. Without proof of power, the dead would swarm the ring and tear them apart. Grim Reaper could not fight them all. So they reached for the only proof they had. They raised the scythe over their head. The captured half of the Devil's soul flared inside the blade. Light spilled down the shaft. The horde flinched back as one. "This is your master's soul," Grim Reaper said. "I harvested it. I hold it now." They swung the scythe down and drove the blade into the cracked stone of the platform. The whole hall shook. The Devil's light poured out of the blade and into the floor. It ran through the dead like a current. The horde stopped shambling. Their empty eyes turned toward the ring. One by one, the rotted courtiers bent their knees. The bent thing in the purple coat knelt last. "The soul commands," it whispered. "We serve the soul." Grim Reaper had their court. The dead bowed. But as the light drained from the blade into the kneeling horde, the scythe went cold and quiet in their hands. The captured half of the Devil's soul was gone. Grim Reaper had spent it to buy the room. Then the floor answered. Deep below the ring, something struck the stone from underneath. Once. Twice. The kneeling courtiers turned their heads toward the sound. The other half of the Devil's soul was down there, and it had felt its twin poured out above. Grim Reaper gripped the empty scythe. They ruled Hell now. And the thing beneath Hell had just learned exactly where they stood.

The floor cracked open. Grim Reaper stepped back as stone split down the middle of the ring. Heat poured up. The kneeling courtiers pressed their faces to the ground. From the pit rose a shape wearing the Devil's face, half-formed, red light leaking through its skin. The escaped half-soul had climbed up to answer the twin Grim Reaper had spent. It fixed empty eyes on the thief who ruled its court. "You poured out my other half," the Devil said. "Now I take yours." It raised a claw and the broken hall grew dark. The dead courtiers did not move to help. They watched their old master and their new one, waiting to see which would still stand. Grim Reaper lifted the scythe, but the blade was cold and empty now. No light answered. The Devil laughed and swung. The blow threw Grim Reaper across the platform and into a fallen pillar. Bone struck stone. The scythe skidded away over the cracked floor. Then a shot cracked through the hall. The Devil staggered. A red-haired woman stood in an archway, a compact handgun raised in both hands. She wore a red leather jacket and a hard smile. Grim Reaper had never seen her before, but she was firing at the Devil, and that made her useful. "Get up, bones," she called. "I didn't climb down here to watch you lose." She fired again. The rounds punched into the Devil's soft red skin and bought Grim Reaper three seconds. The woman moved along the wall, drawing the Devil's eyes off the platform. "Ruby Bost. I hunt things that crawl out of holes. You're welcome." Grim Reaper grabbed the scythe and understood the trap in a breath. The empty blade could not kill this thing. But it could still harvest. Grim Reaper had spent the first half to win the court. The second half stood before them now, whole enough to catch. "Keep it looking at you," Grim Reaper called. Ruby fired her last rounds and swore. The Devil turned toward her, claw raised. Grim Reaper crossed the platform and swung the scythe into its back. The blade bit deep. Red light rushed up the shaft and filled the cold steel. The Devil shrieked and folded inward, dragged into the blade. Then the light guttered out halfway. The Devil's shape thinned but did not vanish. The scythe held only part of it. The rest tore free and dove back into the pit, screaming down through the broken floor. The soul had split a second time. Grim Reaper stood over the closing crack, scythe warm again, half a soul caught inside. The court had a captured Devil-soul once more. But the deepest half had escaped again, deeper now, angrier. Ruby lowered her empty gun and looked at the throne above the wreckage. "So," she said. "You're the new landlord. We should talk about what's still down there."